You may be able to spend all week playing Murder under the Microscope or you may only see your lovely teacher ;) once a week. Regardless of your timetable constraints, getting the best from the game requires firm time management. You need to timetable everything then stick to your schedule. The game falls into three phases:
understanding the underlying issues
the investigation
the production of a digital story.
Phase 1: Pre-investigation In this phase it is important to:
gain an understanding of the complex interactions in an ecosystem
work on the activity cards (in the Activity Cards section) which will demonstrate and underscore the environmental issues
familiarise yourselves with the 10 possible crime sites.
You have just two weeks for this phase. For time-starved secondary school pupils, the crime site familiarisation could be a homework task. What is essential is that you are familiar with catchments and their issues, have a passing knowledge of the crime site (or know where to find it) and are ready for the investigation.
Phase 2: The investigation The investigation stage is a heady experience. The eco-crime scenario with its variety of characters and events is fictitious. However, the towns are real. The victims and villains need to be researched. Clues arrive daily and should be collected and tested. Agent X may pop up with his diabolical quizzes and cryptic clues.
As you learn about the villains, victims and crime sites, you will have opportunities to demonstrate your learning and hypothesise about what happened. The whole team (class) needs to build up plausible stories or scenarios that involve a correct victim, villain and crime site. This will involve whole-class discussion and evaluation of the research findings.
If you find you are missing vital information in your particular scenario, you should email Catchment HQ’s science experts with a question. You will be presenting your scenarios to the rest of the class and brainstorming the possible scenarios. Finally, you need to sit down and view the last videos and messages with all that knowledge behind you so that you can make your accusation.
The weeks will vanish before your eyes. Sit down with your timetable to schedule this second stage now because, when the investigation starts, you just won’t have time. Finally, remember that the accusation must be made via the website. Faxed or emailed accusations will not be accepted.
Phase 3: The digital story While this stage of the game is not compulsory, it does provide a springboard for the creation of a digital story documenting a local environmental action. Enter your digital story into the Connected Learning Awards at the following site. http://cliwww.det.nsw.edu.au/services/awards.htm
Time management
You may be able to spend all week playing Murder under the Microscope or you may only see your lovely teacher ;) once a week. Regardless of your timetable constraints, getting the best from the game requires firm time management. You need to timetable everything then stick to your schedule.The game falls into three phases:
Phase 1: Pre-investigation
In this phase it is important to:
- gain an understanding of the complex interactions in an ecosystem
- work on the activity cards (in the Activity Cards section) which will demonstrate and underscore the environmental issues
- familiarise yourselves with the 10 possible crime sites.
You have just two weeks for this phase. For time-starved secondary school pupils, the crime site familiarisation could be a homework task. What is essential is that you are familiar with catchments and their issues, have a passing knowledge of the crime site (or know where to find it) and are ready for the investigation.Phase 2: The investigation
The investigation stage is a heady experience. The eco-crime scenario with its variety of characters and events is fictitious. However, the towns are real. The victims and villains need to be researched. Clues arrive daily and should be collected and tested. Agent X may pop up with his diabolical quizzes and cryptic clues.
As you learn about the villains, victims and crime sites, you will have opportunities to demonstrate your learning and hypothesise about what happened. The whole team (class) needs to build up plausible stories or scenarios that involve a correct victim, villain and crime site. This will involve whole-class discussion and evaluation of the research findings.
If you find you are missing vital information in your particular scenario, you should email Catchment HQ’s science experts with a question. You will be presenting your scenarios to the rest of the class and brainstorming the possible scenarios. Finally, you need to sit down and view the last videos and messages with all that knowledge behind you so that you can make your accusation.
The weeks will vanish before your eyes. Sit down with your timetable to schedule this second stage now because, when the investigation starts, you just won’t have time. Finally, remember that the accusation must be made via the website. Faxed or emailed accusations will not be accepted.
Phase 3: The digital story
While this stage of the game is not compulsory, it does provide a springboard for the creation of a digital story documenting a local environmental action. Enter your digital story into the Connected Learning Awards at the following site.
http://cliwww.det.nsw.edu.au/services/awards.htm